Social Media Marketing

Many of you interested in search engine optimization or internet marketing may have heard of the term social media. Social Media Marketing (SMM) has become a popular alternative for online business branding. They are valuable Internet marketing and networking resources for business.



What is Social Media?
"Social media essentially is a category of online media where people are talking, participating, sharing, networking, and bookmarking online."

"Social media are media for social interaction, using highly accessible and scalable publishing techniques."

There are many categories of social media sites. A few examples of these social media websites are:

Social Networking:
Social networking websites are online services, platforms, that focus on building and reflecting of social networks or social relations among people, e.g., who share interests and/or activities. Most social network services are web based and provide means for users to interact over the internet, such as e-mail and instant messaging. Widely used examples of social networking sites are Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, LinkedIn, Bebo and Orkut.

Wikis:
Wikis are websites that allow you to create, edit and share information about a subject or topic. Wikipedia, wikiHow, Wetpaint and WikiFAQ are good examples of wikis.

Video sharing:
Video sharing websites allow users to distribute their video clips. Some services may charge, but the large majority of them offer free services. Many services have options for private sharing and other publication options. Video sharing services can be classified into several categories. YouTube, Yahoo! Video, Vimeo, Metacafe, GoogleVideo and Dailymotion are great examples of Video sharing sites.

Photo sharing:
Photo-sharing websites allow users to upload pictures and images to a personal account which can then be viewed by web users the world wide. Major photo-sharing websites: Flickr, Fotopic.net, SlideShare.net, MyPlick.com, Slide.com

Social Bookmarking:
Social bookmarking is a method for Internet users to organize, store, manage and search for bookmarks of resources online and Social bookmarking sites are a popular way to store, classify, share and search links through the practice of folksonomy techniques on the Internet. StumbleUpon, del.icio.us, Digg.com and Reddit are good examples of social bookmarking sites.

Advantages of Social Media Marketing:

• Increase traffic to your website/blog.
• Increase Brand Awareness
• Increase Leads and Revenues